


After Thirteen Years

by earlybloomingparentheses



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Ficlet, M/M, Post-Azkaban, Reunion, from tumblr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 07:37:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17137691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/earlybloomingparentheses/pseuds/earlybloomingparentheses
Summary: There’s not a chance in hell Remus is going to let Sirius go on the run without seeing him again first.





	After Thirteen Years

There’s not a chance in hell Remus is going to let Sirius go on the run without seeing him again first. Thirteen years rise up inside him, demanding a reckoning. So the moment he finishes packing up his things, bruises from the full moon still as tender and fresh as Harry’ goodbye, he goes after him. Sirius flew north, farther up into the Highlands: into the twisting maze of mountains and valleys, where rocks and mist and ancient magic will hide him.

Remus finds him as the sun is setting. The hippogriff is drowsing in a dim little cave when Remus arrives. Otherwise the cave is empty, a nest of bones and dirt—but then Remus hears the crunch of footsteps outside.

“Oh. Remus.” Sirius lowers his wand. He is silhouetted in the mouth of the cave, the setting sun low and blinding behind him, throwing his body into shadow. He looks, Remus thinks, like a hero from a Greek tragedy, weary but iron-strong; or like an old god, a god of the hunt. Remus the intruder in his sacred domain. 

All the words that have been arranging and rearranging themselves in Remus’ head since he departed from Hogwarts flee. He is left with the suddenly frantic thrum of his pulse and the sharp-edged crest of something like nausea deep in his belly. Sirius’ backlit frame is angular and too thin. There is a tiny tremor in his fingers.

Remus steps forward, meaning to—embrace him or—kiss him, like they haven’t in thirteen years, or—or just get close; but something gleams in his friend’s dark eyes and all at once his legs give out, and he stumbles, and hits the ground, falling on his knees before Sirius Black.

He feels the rightness of his position deep in his bones as soon as his body bends below him.

“I’m sorry,” he says hoarsely. “I believed you betrayed James and Lily. I believed you killed Peter. And all those Muggles. I’m so sorry.”

He bows his head and does not ask for forgiveness. Some things can’t be forgiven. 

Sirius is silent for a long moment. The rustle of the wind through the leaves and Buckbeak’s sleeping breaths are the only sounds, save for the rush in Remus’ ears.

Remus feels, very gently, fingers in his hair. 

“Why didn’t you tell Dumbledore about me?” Sirius asks. His voice is alien, ragged with disuse. “About Padfoot?”

Remus does not, cannot, look up. “I don’t know.”

Sirius’ nails scrape softly against Remus’ scalp.

Remus lets out a breath. “I couldn’t,” he confesses. “Not even to protect Harry. I couldn’t.” 

“You were protecting me.”

Even now that he knows what he knows, the guilt and shame of his silence lie thick at the back of Remus’ tongue. The fact that he kept mute regarding the Marauders does not mitigate his crimes; it only makes them worse. He was a traitor to Sirius _and_ a traitor to Dumbledore. To Harry. 

“Stand up, Remus,” Sirius says quietly.

Remus shakes his head, his eyes too close to spilling over to raise even his gaze. He wants to kneel here on the rough floor of this cave all night, till his legs are sore and he is cold and numb and he has performed some small fraction of the penance he owes for disavowing his best friend, his lover, the savior of his youth. 

A creak of limbs and Sirius sinks to the floor of the cave, kneeling face to face with Remus. The light is not so bright behind him now, and when Remus lifts his eyes enough to take Sirius’ bony hand in his and kiss, gently, his cracked, grimy knuckles, the lines of Sirius’ features are sharper, clearer.

“Stay the night with me,” says Sirius. “Keep me warm.”

 _Penance_ , Remus thinks, but as he curls up around Sirius on the hard uneven ground, pebbles digging into his bruises and his aching back, the slow leeching of heat from his own body and into Sirius’ does not feel like a punishment.


End file.
